"All teachers reported effective results and based off of their excitement it was noted that the students were likewise engaged and thinking outside of the normal parameters."
Formative Assessment
Purpose
TeachFirst’s Formative Assessment Series™ prepares principals, leadership teams, and teacher leaders to help their learning communities turn a laser focus on the role of formative assessment in the classroom. The sessions investigate how daily, minute-to-minute decisions inform teachers’ instruction and impact student achievement, particularly for the most challenged learners.
Each module incorporates three essential strands
- Exploring teachers’ perceptions of assessments and how these perceptions influence their current practice
- Examining how to create a culture within the school that recognizes and values the role of formative assessments in student achievement
- Investigating ways to develop partnerships with students to provide them with quality feedback in order to increase their achievement.
Expected outcomes
Upon completion of the series, all staff will:
- Understand assessment for learning (formative) and be able to differentiate it clearly from assessment of learning (summative)
- Understand the information formative assessments provide teachers and students
- Develop a school-wide plan for establishing a collaborative learning culture that allows for successful student-teacher partnerships in formative assessments
- Develop and apply skills for checking for understanding in a variety of ways
- Develop and apply skills for providing effective feedback specifically to increase motivation and reinforce learning
- Implement strategies for helping students provide student-to-teacher feedback
- Develop a plan for using PLCs to gather and interpret evidence from formative assessments to inform instruction
Content
The series consists of three full-day modules:
- Module One: Formative Assessment: Assessment FOR Learning
- Module Two: Checking for Understanding and Providing Effective Feedback
- Module Three: Closing the Feedback Loop: Strengthening the Student-Teacher Partnership
During each module, building leadership teams and teacher leaders actively practice, discuss, and customize activities focused on the above topics. Research demonstrates that participants who actively engage in learning by doing rather than learning from listening or thinking are far more likely to implement the learned actions (Pfeffer & Sutton, 2000).
Teams leave each session with a clear action plan and the necessary skills for leading the activities back at their school. All activities are designed to be delivered during faculty meetings, PLC meetings, or staff development time.